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BBC One
Looks like all that experience flying the TARDIS is about to pay off for Matt Smith: he’s just joined the cast of the upcoming Terminator: Genesis in an unspecified-but-important role. Deadline reports that the former Doctor will play a character with a strong connection to John Connor (Jason Clarke), who will also play a major role in the film’s sequels. Smith is the latest nerd-friendly addition to a cast that includes Game of Thrones’ Emilia Clarke, Divergent villain Jai Courtney, and Dayo Okeniyi from The Hunger Games. And of course, Arnold Schwarzenegger will be back to step back into his signature cyborg armor.
The franchise is a good fit for Smith, who already has plenty of experience jumping from time period to time period and planet to planet on Doctor Who. In fact, Smith is so good at handling rifts in time and space that we could see him fitting in, no matter when or where in time you dropped him. To prove this theory, we’ve crafted a timeline of Smith’s possible time travel adventures, using the most iconic time travel-based movies and TV shows. We start, of course, with the first major civilization…
- 410 BC: Smith’s first trip goes back to Ancient Greece, where he hopes to sit in on one of Socrates’ lectures, only to find out from one of the other students that “So-Crates” had hopped into a time machine and set off for the future to help two slackers in their intellectual pursuits. (Bill and Ted’s Excellent Adventure)- 528 AD: Smith finds himself in Camelot, where he convinces the King to make things right with his people before Merlin and Morgan Le Fay manage ursurp him. But first, there’s a little matter of jazzing up all that boring old chamber music… (A Connecticut Yankee in King Arthur’s Court)- 1400s: Climbing through a hole in the fabric of time, Smith arrives in Sherwood Forest, where he is recruited by Robin Hood his Merry Men, and a band of dwarves to help give to the poor. Well, he intends to, but once he finds out how insane Robin Hood is, he decides it might be better to head elsewhere and avoid getting killed. (Time Bandits)- 1621: Smith arrives in colonial America to find two talking turkeys scrambling around in an attempt to escape some hunters and put a stop to the first Thanksgiving. He decides to help them, thinking it will be funny, but discovers they’re just dumb and so he leaves it up to them to figure it out. How much trouble can two turkeys with a time machine cause, after all? (Free Birds)- 1920s: After he accidentally gets into the wrong car, Smith finds himself transported to 1920s Paris, where he hops from party to party with the Fitzgeralds and a fellow time traveler who wanted writing advice. He doesn’t remember much but he’s pretty sure someone actually had a lampshade on their head at one point. (Midnight in Paris)- 1955: There’s another mix up with cars, and Smith ends up crashing the Pine Valley prom, where he discovers that his best friend is actually his son. It takes a while to process, but his future wife is really pretty, even if there’s some weird tension there with their son. (Back to the Future)- 1959: Smith hops forward a few years, where he meets the smartest dog of all time and not-so-bright boy, and helps them work on a time machine of their own called the WABAC. They invite him to join in on an adventure, but Sherman accidentally hits the wrong button, and Smith is sent forward in time by himself… (Mr. Peabody)- 1981: To the early ‘80s, where he meets Alex Drake, who is determined to figure out how she ended up in the past (although if you ask Smith, he thinks she should be more concerned with the clown that’s following her around.) Luckily, he remembers a few things about Sam Tyler that should help nudge her investigation along, even if she probably won’t like what she discovers. (Ashes to Ashes)- 1984: Smith hops forward a few years, only to find himself caught in the crossfire of a murderous cyborg with an Austrain accent, and a human soldier who is trying to keep the cyborg from killing an innocent woman. Once he realizes that he will soon get to act out this scenario on a safe, closed, set, he hightails it out of there. (Terminator)- 1993: Somehow, Smith manages to jump to an alternate universe, and finds himself at Hogwarts castle, so he immediately searches out Harry, Ron and Hermione, and helps them save Buckbeak, then rides the hippogriff off into the sunset. It all goes smoothly, although Harry is confused as to why Smith keeps calling him “Dan.” (Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban)- 1994: The time turner can only turn so far, and Smith ends up a year in the future, where he agrees to help Max Walker investigate a crooked politician. He doesn't really care about the plot, he really just wanted the chance to hang out with Jean Claude Van Damme. (Time Cop)- 2004: After Smith and Walker arrive in 2004, he heads to a charming lake house to get in some R&amp;R, only to find a guy staring forlornly at a mailbox, waiting for the flag to raise. It’s a little too sappy and maudlin for him, so he tells the guy to go chase after his love, or at the very least, to find a red pill that would put him in a more exciting sci-fi universe. (The Lake House)- 3000: Smith rockets forward to the end of the millennium, where he stumbles across a cargo-delivery company run by the most dysfunctional group of people he has ever met. Still, he lets himself get roped into drinking with the robot and his friends, and it’s the most fun he has on his whole trip. Too bad the accident-prone intern cut the party short by accidentally sending him forward in time. (Futurama)- 3978: Smith washes up on the beach of a weirdly familiar-looking planet, only to find that the natives – all of whom appear to be apes – aren’t thrilled with his presence. He manages to escape his capture and follows the shoreline in order to find a way home, only to discover, to his horror, the ruins of the Statue of Liberty. (Planet of the Apes)
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MTV
A year never looked quite as good as 2014 in the new calendar from Reflect it Back, a project for social good. Tyler Posey and Colton Haynes rounded up some of their Teen Wolf buddies as well as some other young Hollywood stars in order to create MIRROR: A Calendar for Social Good. The calendar, shot by photographer Doug Inglish, features the abs of Posey and Haynes as well as their werewolf pals Tyler Hoechlin, Max Carver, and Charlie Carver. Parker Young of Suburgatory, Chris Zylka of Twisted, and Kendrick Sampson recently on The Vampire Diaries joined the Teen Wolf guys in posing for the calendar.
An information video on the Reflect it Back site features a few of the stars talking about the project — they wanted to use their talents to give something back to the world. Attractive and philanthropic? What more could you ask for in a dream guy (or guys)? There are also plenty of clips from behind the scenes of the photo shoot, which seems like it would have been a blast.
For those wondering, the calendar costs $24.99 (before shipping and taxes) and the proceeds will benefit several charities including the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation. Check out the hashtag #ReflectitBack to get in on the conversation and see some more behind the scenes photos of the calendar’s stars.
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20th Century Fox via Everett Collection
Emily Watson is a multi-award winning actress who has played a variety of complex and iconic roles, but the thing she finds the most fun about Rosa Hubermann, the character she plays in her latest film, The Book Thief, is that she's so unpleasant. In the film adaptation of Markus Zusak's bestseller, Rosa is the stern wife of Hans Hubermann (Geoffrey Rush), a German couple who take in a foster child, Leisel Meminger (Sophie Nèlisse) at the start of World War II. However, once the family begins sheltering Max Vandenburg (Ben Schnetzer), a Jewish man, her frosty exterior melts to reveal a woman who will — in Watson's own words — "fight like a tiger" to protect the people she loves.
In our interview with Watson, ahead of The Book Thief's November 8 release, we talked about he first impressions of the story, why she felt so free to be terrible to Geoffrey Rush, and the joy she finds in playing such a "vile" character.
I’m actually a really big fan of the novel, and I thought the film did a great job translating it to screen, so I was wondering what was your introduction to the story? Had you read the novel beforehand, or did it start with the script? The script was, I’m ashamed to say, my first introduction, and I thought it was an amazing script, and then I read the book and I thought it was an amazing book. But I think it’s quite a successful extrapolation — Geoffrey was talking about it earlier, that it was a very difficult thing to find a film language because you can’t have — you know, Death narrating everything is brilliant, but it’s a literary device, but I think that’s what’s really unique about the book is that it’s a view of this, it’s an indifferent. Death is indifferent to who’s dying, in a way, and Death is a beneficent presence.
You said that it was really exciting to play a character who was so unpleasant. She’s also very understated and really quiet about her emotions. Was that part of the challenge, and was that also exciting for you?I think she’s someone who’s very disappointed and very angry. I guess in a good Protestant way she keeps her lip buttoned, but she’s pretty vile. And then she gets to the point where the real events, the huge events going on around them start to break her open, in a way, and actually she has something that’s he loves, which is a home full of needy children who need her and she loves them and they’re under threat and she will fight like a tiger to protect them. She’s probably never felt more alive and she’s a person with great love in her heart, somewhere, but finds it very difficult to express.
Was it intimidating to play such a beloved character or are you at the point in your career where nothing scares you? No, I think it’s like flying an airplane. If you don’t have the fear, don’t do it. In a way, though, that the “beloved character,” you can’t be intimidated by that, you’ve just got to try and go with it as much as you can, but in a sense you have to bring yourself to it too. I mean, it was good fun, just deciding I need to look as much like a s**t bag as I possibly can, I need to look fat, I need to scrape my hair back and they put really ugly, aging makeup and gray, scraped back, dirty hair and after about a week I just kind of got used to it, really, and being nasty was really good fun as well.
There are a lot of newcomers and relative newcomers in the cast. What was it like working with them? I mean, Sophie and Ben, are both beautiful young actors, and Ben particularly was in his last year at drama school, so he knew a lot about the theory of acting and was sort of wide-eyed with astonishment to be in the room with us and doing it an just asking questions all the time. Really, really lovely young man. And Sophie as well, I remember her after the first day of rehearsal just looking at us really curiously, and Brian [Percival, the director] asking her, you know, “Are you okay?” and she said “I didn’t really know you could go into things as deeply as this.” Because we sat and talked and talked and talked about everything, you know, about the family and the history and what was going on in Germany, and Geoffrey and I both love to talk. And she was sort of, “Okay, I get it.” And she really was like a sponge, soaking it up.
And you’ve worked with Geoffrey before, did that help you build the relationship between Hans and Rosa? Yeah, we’ve had real fun together before. Doing The Life and Death of Peter Sellers was a hoot, and then we did press, we went to Cannes, we had a laugh, we had a hoot, so we had that. We knew each other and we knew we had shared a sense of humor, so actually it sort of gave me license to be really, really mean to him and just get on with it in a way. We didn’t have to be sensitive.
I wanted to ask a little bit about the accent you use in the film. It’s a bit rare to have an American produced film with characters actually using German accents. Uh, in The Reader, they did. If you actually look, a lot of really good movies of this period, they do, really. Yeah, we had dialect coaches, we had a lot of coaching and lessons, but also we were surrounded by Germans, so that made it easier. But also, it’s the inflection that helps with the character.
This is a pretty intense experience, but the film has some lighter moments as well. Were there any scenes that were a lot of fun to film? I liked filming the scene where I hit Geoffrey round the head, when I’m feeding [Max] soup and he throws up. That was a really lovely demonstration of the relationship between actors on the set, because Ben was sitting there, and he was doing his very best sort of absolutely immersion in the total “I’ve just arrived in a strange house, and I’m feeling very ill and I’m going to be sick”, and Geoffrey and I kind of looked at each other and said, “Okay. If you show that you’re going to be sick, it’s going to spoil the gag. It’s a gag. So don’t.” and then, of course Geoffrey is the comic actor, so it was sort of “Okay, Geoffrey. How many spoons do I give him? One spoon, two spoons, or three spoons before he gags? What’s the right comic [timing]?” So, yeah, we had the master comedian sort of turning his hat, and it was really lovely. And then, just getting up and hitting him, just [thwack], that was the best. I don’t know which one they used in the film, I can’t remember, but one was a really resounding thwap, and the entire crew were on the floor laughing. That was good fun.
And were there any you found particularly difficult? Going to the school and telling [Liesel] that Max was going to live, that sort of final cracking of Rosa [where she] does something utterly emotional and impulsive and dangerous, but full of love. In a way, it was a great release to be able to do it like that, but it takes a lot of concentration, I guess, to get to the right place for that.
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Jennifer Clasen/FOX
Coming off of last week's Season 3 premiere of New Girl, which finally put to rest the will-they-won't-they of Jess and Nick's sexual tensioned filled relationship (they're officially together, everyone), Tuesday's "Nerd" episode got back to the usual sticky situations that those loft friends so often get themselves into.
Plots: Nick (Jake Johnson) and Jess (Zooey Deschanel) figuratively time warp back to high school and have to figure out how to fit in with the "cool kids" that are Jess' new teacher colleagues, Schmidt (Max Greenfield) still has to decide if he wants to be with Elizabeth (Merritt Wever — congrats on your Emmy) or CeCe (Hannah Simone), and Winston (Lamorne Morris) vies for the heart of his lovely Daisy (Brenda Song).
Once a Nerd, Always a NerdIn the A-plot of "Nerds," Jess frets that she's not fitting in with her fellow teachers at her new job (side note: when did Jess get a new job?). Nick, being the kind-hearted but misguided person that he is, offers to help Jess mingle with the hip teachers that she so desperately wants to be friends with. The "cool" teachers, who definitely would have been the popular and mean kids in high school, pick on Jess until Nick pulls out a few tricks (offering them school supplies and endless free booze) to buy their friendship. Unfortunately, Jess ends up trying too hard to impress them (she stands in a toilet and sings for them and then breaks into her boss' backyard while they ditch her), but good ol' Nick Miller comes to the rescue. He lets Jess know that he would have noticed her in high school (d'aww), and then they get it on in the teachers' lounge.
This plot was actually pretty endearing. Yes, it was incredibly painful and awkward to watch Jess be bullied by the mean crew, but her "old man" (the name that Nick wants her to call him) was there to save the day. He may have a habit of messing everything up, but he cares enough about Jess to realize when he's being a total dud and needs to clean up his mess.
Ladies' ManMeanwhile, Schmidt tries to balance his two relationships since he still hasn't broken up with one of them. In the classic two-date situation, Schmidt must figure out a way to keep CeCe and Elizabeth away from each other at a work party. His Schmidt-hating coworker keeps on trying to ruin things for him (she's jealous of his new office), but somehow he pulls off the whole scheme. Elizabeth walks off believing that CeCe is catering the event, and CeCe thinks that Elizabeth works at the company. Ladies, you're not as smart as I thought you were. Well, I take that back — Elizabeth, you're not as smart as I thought you were.
Oh, Schmidt, you poor idiot — decide between Elizabeth and CeCe already! Everyone knows how this situation is going to turn out: Schmidt finally gets caught and then both of the ladies dump him (and probably cause him physical harm). Either that or they all turn to polygamy (hey, it could happen).
Cat LadyThe third plot of this episode involves Winston pet-sitting Daisy's cat Ferguson (because of course that would be the cat's name). Thinking that Daisy wants to take things further since she's trusting him with her cat, Winston adorably asks Daisy to be his girlfriend. Daisy says yes, but it's apparent that there's an unknown man in her shower (in other words, she's sleeping with someone else). To get back at Daisy, Winston feebly attempts to kill her cat, but comes to terms with being a person with a soul and decides to let Ferguson live. When Daisy comes to pick up Ferguson, Winston officially dumps her and refuses to let her keep the cat (because both him and Ferguson "deserve better").
Does anyone else remember when Winston used to be the too-cool-for-school archetype in New Girl? When did he become the guy who's ferociously bad at pranks, wears a sweatshirt as pants, and spends a whole episode trying to kill a cat? Whenever it happened, it looks like the writers aren't turning back now. They've found Winston's niche and they're sticking with it, just like they have with all of the other main characters: Jess is eccentric, Nick is a bumbling fool with (mostly) good intentions, Schmidt is neurotic, and Winston, well, Winston isn't quite right in the head. God bless them all.
Some of the Best Moments and Lines from This Week's New Girl Episode- "Did you say that cats are obsessed with your nipples?" - CeCe to Schmidt- The fact that two of the mean teachers are Angela Kinsey (Angela from The Office) and Dreama Walker (June from Don't Trust the B— in Apartment 23) and that they take liquid ecstasy.- "Leave it to me to fix it." - Nick to Jess (I've never felt more scared for Jess' life).- Nick thinks half of a ripped dollar equals 50 cents.- "My heart is a two-man bike and I want you in the rear." - Winston's ideal way to ask Daisy to be his girlfriend- The boys sing/shout "I Believe I Can Fly" to wake up hungover Jess.- "Now I'm no plumber, but I'm 99 percent sure there was a guy in her shower." - Winston to Nick- The ways Winston tries to kill the cat: strangle it with a rope, whack it with a bat, bludgeon it with a shovel, beat it with a hammer, and smother it with a pillow.- The fact that Elizabeth might be more sexually adventurous than Schmidt (she's down for all sorts of fantasy situations).
What did you think of the episode? How far do you think Schmidt's love triangle is going to last?
More:'New Girl' Season 3 Scoop: Damaon Wayans Jr. is Coming Back as Coach!'New Girl' Season 2 Finale Recap: Relationship Woes and a Taylor Swift CameoNick and Jess' Hot Hookup on 'New Girl' and 16 Other Sizzling TV Sex Scenes
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20th Century Fox
Walking down the main street of Molching, you feel much like The Book Thief’s young Liesel Meminger (Sophie Nélisse) must shortly after she first arrives at Haus Huberman: overwhelmed, filled with the urge to explore, and, above all, cold. The snow on the ground is fake but you could easily think it’s real. It’s a morning in early April and the temperature is barely above 40 degrees Fahrenheit, with a biting wind chill. “I wanted the weather of Europe to be like a character in the book,” author Marcus Zusak says. He got his wish for the film, too.
Production designer Simon Elliott has created a life-size replica of Liesel’s adopted town on the lot of Studio Babelsberg, about 30 minutes west of Berlin, and it’s a masterpiece of detail. The fictional tale Markus Zusak has spun about a young girl in Nazi Germany forced to live with foster parents after being separated from her mother has been brought to life with the most loving care imaginable. 1930s-era cars sputter down the street, kids play and hide behind barrels, each of the buildings has a little bit of paint chipping off here and there, and the windows are coated with fog. Even the fake snow is strategically laced with dirt.
Fittingly enough for our own entrance, the scene being shot is of Liesel making her first arrival in Molching when she’s so distraught about having to be separated from her mother that she refuses to leave the car. One of her new caretakers, Rosa Huberman, played by Emily Watson (Breaking the Waves, Punch-Drunk Love), is just finding out that she’ll only be taking charge of one child after all: Liesel’s brother died on the train trip to Molching. It’s a tragedy, but for the hard-edged Rosa, it means something else. “She had expected the government allowances for taking in two foster children,” Watson says. “Not just one.” That seems harsh, but this is a harsh world. It’s Nazi Germany in 1939. World War II is about to begin, and the Holocaust is well under way. Rosa’s actually a kind woman, but she has a tough demeanor. “I think a lot of ordinary German people faced that moment where they had to ask ‘Am I going to do the right thing or am I going to save my own skin?’” Watson says. “I think Rosa’s a brave, good person. She just doesn’t know how to show it.” The honesty in the portrayal of a character like Rosa is refreshing, and indicative of Zusak’s vision. There are certainly fanatical Nazis living in Molching, but many others are just trying to keep their heads down and survive.
Shooting in Germany was essential for authenticity, and though the main street of Molching was built on the Studio Babelsberg lot, director Brian Percival shot on location as well. One of the biggest scenes was of a book burning, where Liesel lives up to the title and steals one of the volumes about to be cast into the flames. The team went to the remarkably well-preserved small town of Görlitz near the Polish border to film that scene in its main square — which was to double for Molching. Production designer Simon Elliott, who previously lent grit to the sets of the BBC’s acclaimed 2005 Bleak House miniseries, designed the end of the street so that it would appear to adjoin what was shot in Görlitz. “Making a studio set look seamless with location shooting is something I’ve also had to do quite a bit on Downton Abbey,” director Percival says. “In reality, the upstairs scenes and the downstairs scenes on the show aren’t shot anywhere near each other.”
The cast and crew were taken aback by the effect of transforming Görlitz into the site of a Nazi rally. “You’re not prepared for how overwhelming it is to show up on a train platform and see nothing but swastikas lining everything,” Watson says. “It’s quite a formidable experience.” It had a similar effect on Geoffrey Rush (Hans Huberman). “We went to Görlitz for the rally, and the Nazi imagery is terribly overwhelming,” the Oscar-winner says. “You could see how the German extras were in turmoil over having, for some of them, to relive a scene like this.”
20th Century Fox
Though an epic set piece like the book burning took a great deal of preparation, production designer Elliott put even more time toward getting the intimate details of Haus Huberman just right, even down to the kind of jars stocked in their kitchen. “We had to make the interior spaces big enough for the cameras and lighting,” he says, of the house interior, built separately from the village on an adjoining soundstage. “But all of the items within you would have found in an actual 1930s German home.” At the bottom is the cellar, or keller if you prefer the German, where Hans Huberman keeps wine, sacks of potatoes, and eventually hides Max (Ben Schnetzer), the son of the Jewish man who fought alongside him in World War I and taught him to play the accordion. There’s also the chalk outlines of words Hans and Max are teaching Liesel, as they begin the process of teaching her how to read, one of the many dramatic highlights of the book.
To bring the world of The Book Thief to life research was key. Oscar-winning costume designer Anna B. Sheppard closely examined thousands of photos from the period to get the look of German civilians — and kids — just right. “I guess I’ve become a go-to costume designer for anything having to do with World War II, but my experience on each one of these movies has been so different,” Sheppard says, before rattling off her incredible filmography. “Steven Spielberg had already spoken to so many Holocaust survivors by the time I started Schindler’s List, while Roman Polanski could tell me exactly what was right and wrong about any of my designs since he had actually lived through many of the events of The Pianist. Quentin Tarantino had me watch old movies to get ready for Inglourious Basterds. And Captain America: The First Avenger was going for something even more different, still.” Sheppard hasn’t had to go very far to shoot those other films — all of them shot scenes at Studio Babelsberg, where there’s even a street called “Quentin Tarantino-strasse.”
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If you hadn’t already realized it, The Book Thief has assembled pretty much a dream team of behind-the-scenes talent to translate Zusak’s novel to celluloid. Even since our visit John Williams has signed on to compose the film’s score. It’s why 20th Century Fox was so happy with what they were seeing that they pushed its release date up from January 2014 to November 15, right smack in the heart of Oscar season. And it’s shaping up to be a major contender. Sure, the Academy loves to recognize films adapted from acclaimed novels about defining moments in history starring previously nominated thesps like Rush and Watson. But it’s the passion for the material you sense in every person on set that may really make its chances golden. Film sets can often be jaded places. Not here. “At all times you’re aware of the bigger history here,” Rush says. “Even on top of the events we’re depicting, we’re at Studio Babelsberg. My God, this is where Murnau and von Sternberg and Pabst and Billy Wilder and Lubitsch all filmed.”
Zusak had never been on a film set before when we caught up with him on Molching’s main street. You could sense his wonder at seeing his creation made real. The bigger test, though, may be what his parents ultimately think. “My dad doesn’t give a compliment without making you feel bad,” he says. “He said after he read both the English and German versions, ‘It’s not so much that the book is s**t in English, it’s that it’s so much better in German.’ Thanks, Dad. The German translator is just a much better writer than I am, I guess.” We doubt if even he will be able to quibble when he sees The Book Thief on the big screen.
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You know you like science fiction. You know you like Matt Damon. And you know you're on board with anything that showcases a handsome bald fella. So yes, you're pretty certain you're going to enjoy Neill Blomkamp's newest feature film, Elysium. There's only one thing you're not quite sure about: what the heck "Elysium" actually is.
The movie lends the name — one you might have heard before — to an exclusive utopia floating just beyond the reach of a decaying planet Earth's common man. The titular space station that plays paradisiacal home to political figures, law enforcement officers, and your everyday rich people, denying the benefits of pristine environments and universal healthcare to the working class schmoes confined to the big blue marble. Enter Max (Damon), a reformed criminal inflicted with a lethal dose of radiation poisoning, who vows to snag a spot in one of Elysium's venerated medical facilities before succumbing to his disease. But in order to get there, he'll need to sneak in — courtesy of a border-hopping underground organization led by a crook named, quite appropriately, Spider. And of course, when you ask a favor of a crook, you're bound to find yourself carrying out one or two illicit deeds in the process.
But hospice on Elysium is worth anything for Max. The proverbial "castle in the clouds" seems to represent all of the ideals to which humanity might aspire: safety, prosperity, uniformity, total submission... yeah, it's starting to get a little iffy there, isn't it? Although Elysium is stocked lovingly with the tropes of science-fiction movie classics — everything from pulp works like Total Recall to mainstream blockbusters like Star Wars to uncategorizable masterpieces like 2001: A Space Odyssey — the film is also clearly quite happy to emulate classic literature. In fact, Blomkamp's Elysium takes its name from one of the greatest and most well-known pieces of writing in human history: Homer's Odyssey.
Homer invented the Elysian plain, a temperate kingdom where mankind knew no trouble. In his epic poem, Homer described the mythical land as that "where life is easiest for men. No snow is there, nor heavy storm, nor ever rain, but ever does Ocean send up blasts of the shrill-blowing West Wind that they may give cooling to men." In a word, paradise.
In fact, so potent is the idea of Elysium as a flawless utopia that many classic minds examined it in their own writings: Greek historian Plutarch and Roman poet Virgil were among those to embed the facet into their work. And centuries past Homer's invention of the golden empire, popular culture keeps a stronghold on Elysium as its go-to heaven-on-Earth: fantasy television shows like Doctor Who, Xena Warrior Princess, and Sailor Moon have welcomed references to Elysium, as have movies like the historical fiction epic Gladiator, the comedy Wanderlust, and the spirited extended metaphor Beasts of the Southern Wild.
But instead of recreating the impeccable Elysium developed by Homer, director Blomkamp seems to draw a bit more directly from some more recent works: the novels of George Orwell and Aldous Huxley will jump to mind in the inspection of the rigidly controlled autocracy kept under glass by military figure Delacourt (Jodie Foster). The flawless sheath drawn over a scathing, fear-generated xenophobia is a staple of sci-fi fiction, with 1984 and Brave New World playing generous benefactors to this eager and inventive new twist on the genre.
We see a lot of "new" in Blomkamp's Elysium, though plenty of fun and familiar homages to Orwell and Huxley, to Philip K. Dick and the many cinematic attempts that have been made of his library, to Star Wars and Kubrick, and to Homer. The "perfect world," the heavenly kingdom just out of reach, is something that artists and scholars have dwelled upon for centuries. But Blomkamp proves that there are always new, fresh ways of looking at time-tested ideas.
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More:'Elysium' ReviewWatch Matt Damon Talk 'Elysium'Neill Blomkamp Is Making a Comedy
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There are a lot of funny moments in The Internship. But the biggest punchline, literally, may come from Harvey Guillen, who plays Zach, a beaten-down member of the Noogle team led by Max Minghella's evil Graham. If you've seen the movie, you know what we're talking about.
Harvey will be joining Hollywood.com's "Summer Movies: Burning Questions" Google+ Hangouts series tonight at 7:00 PM ET/4:00 PM PT to talk The Internship and what else is going on in his career, including his recent GLAAD Media Award for his role on Raising Hope. Tweet your questions to Harvey (@HarveyGuillen) and me, your host Christian Blauvelt (@Ctblauvelt), using the hashtag #HollywoodBurningQuestions. You can watch the live YouTube stream of the Hangout right here and see if your question is answered.
Hope to see you at 7:00 PM ET!
Follow Christian Blauvelt on Twitter @Ctblauvelt | Follow Hollywood.com on Twitter @Hollywood_com
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I don't know about you guys, but I just really want to drive a 2013 Ford Fusion right now. For starters? It has a turbo-charged eco-boost engine that gives you power AND great mileage. Usually you get one of those, but two — pinch me, I'm dreaming! And we haven't even talked about the media console, which handles navigation, incoming texts, and music selection. You so often hear the expression "the future is now" without knowing exactly what it means, but I get it when I consider it in light of the Ford Fusion. Why, I'd race extra hard on a leg that featured one of these killer automobiles as a prize…
Still with us? Sorry about that — these recaps have to make money for Hollywood.com somehow. Last night's leg of The Amazing Race saw teams bopping around Berlin, Germany, as they did very German things and tried to remember super-easy trivia questions. That was about it! No one got hurt. No one fell too far behind. No one was even eliminated (Mona and Beth benefited from a non-elimination round). Life was good in Berlin, Phil's proclaimed "hippest city in the world." So let's ease into it with the cool composure you'd expect from the biggest collection of David Hasselhoff fans on the planet.
Hotheads almost never make it all the way on this show. Sure, rampant aggression gets some teams very, very far…but it's always pretty unsustainable, weaving misery for the people behind it and sometimes causing some unsavory (and costly) blowups or mistakes. I say this to highlight what a great time Anthony and Bates are — two guys who played, ironically, one of the more agro sports out there but have so far taken a pretty measured approach to Race. Bates, the overgrown puppy dog of the two, somehow had his bag stolen on the train. Did he flip out? (I would have!) Sink into depression? No — dude laughed it off, accounted for his passport, and moved on. (And in the process got to flirt more with Caroline. "Do you want some women's underwear?" she asked. Cool it sister, you guys aren't even in Berlin yet.)
That same "what will be, will be" attitude got the duo through an off leg, two, as they were forced to scrap their chosen Detour and start over with the other. "Font Follies," the more blindingly European of the two tasks, involved carrying a giant neon letter from a city square to the Museum of Letters. All the letters were there — a, b, c, d, e, f, g, and so on — in what gave the impression of a futuristic glowing letter garden, neon red and yellow pulsating in the darkness. UNTZ UNTZ UNTZ. Pretty straight-forward task that literally just required teams to walk from point A to point B, albeit awkwardly, but any damage to your letter forced a restart. Bates was too busy chatting up Caroline when his hit the ground and chipped.
Off to the other Detour: "Train Trials," in which teams had to assemble a toy train track and successfully guide their train through one full lap. Joey and Meghan had little trouble with it. Bates and Anthony on the other hand took 7, 8, 9 attempts to get through. Hopefully they were treated to the same "crashing train" graphic that us viewers at home got every time things went awry!
Last week's previews would have had you believe that modified base-jumping from the roof of the Park Inn Hotel was this week's BIG CHALLENGE, but please — those dizzying heights were just a smokescreen for the real thing. Let me ask you a question: do you like tiny rooms filled with skulls? Dolls staring at you with or without eyes? Garbage? Discordant electronic music? Claustrophobia? Grimm's fairy tales art designed like a Saw movie? Then man, you're in LUCK watching the Road Block teams faced: navigating a truly unnerving labyrinth/fun house to find a clue buried within. "It's like Legends of the Hidden Temple, but bad," noted Katie. Hard to say whether psychotropic drugs would have rendered the maze more or less palatable. Can you imagine Phil saying "contestants will now drop a predetermined amount of ecstasy in order to navigate a horrific real-world nightmare-scape." I already watch this show, but I'd really watch that show.
Like we noted above, everybody made it through. Max &amp; Katie quicker than anyone, the first to arrive at the Pit Stop. Bates &amp; Anthony and Mona &amp; Beth brought up the rear. Physically, Bates &amp; Anthony are arguably the biggest threat remaining — in a foot race, as we saw last night, they'd easily take down any of the other teams. But the five teams still racing each seem to (mostly) have it together, any one of them capable of winning the million dollars. Which, if they're smart, they'd spend on a pair of 2013 Ford Focuses. $$$$
Follow Henning on Twitter @HenningFog
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Dyslexic actor Max Irons memorises entire scripts before auditioning for film roles in a bid to avoid embarrassment if he's asked to read for another part. The Host star, son of veteran British actor Jeremy Irons, decided early on that learning lines for multiple characters at a time would be the best way to tackle his learning disability - and it hasn't failed him yet.
He tells New York Post columnist Cindy Adams, "I've wanted to be an actor since I'm (sic) 16. At school in London, I did Neil LaBute's play by learning everybody's lines. I had to. I have dyslexia.
"I handle it because I learn everything beforehand. If evaluating me, (casting bosses) ask, 'Can you read the scene?' I say, 'Absolutely,' and that's because I've learned each person's line ahead of time."

Well, they can't all be perfect. No, I'm not talking about bachelorette parties with sky high expectations, or reunions with college flames, or even d**ks. (Though, apparently, Nick Miller boasts a "prize hog," so some things can be perfect beyond reason). Rather, New Girl episodes can't all be perfect. Sad, but true, especially considering the show's recent track record.
While Tuesday night's new — albeit, out of chronological order — episode "Bachelorette Party" wasn't a bad episode, per se, it wasn't up to snuff with the episodes from the past few weeks. That's largely because Nick and Jess weren't the center of attention, Winston and Schmidt were off doing their own things (well, Schmidt was... Winston was basically a prop), and the focus was on the show's least interesting character, Cece. To be fair, Cece works when she's interacting with Schmidt or Jess, but the storyline about her and her fiancé Shivrang (Satya Bhabha) is just so uninspired. Sort of like their relationship.
Jess threw Cece the surprise bachelorette party of her dreams, which turned out to be something of a nightmare when her guests (a mixture of models, one lawyer, and Jess' very pregnant lesbian gynocologist friend) don't mesh, Cece's fiancé Shivrang's conservative Indian aunt tags along and judges the lot, the stripper Alfredo breaks down in tears, and the bride-to-be admits that she is freaked out that she hasn't seen her future husband's manhood.
The whole thing, like their upcoming marriage, feels incredibly rushed. Why is Cece getting married so quickly? (Probably to avoid overthinking what a mistake this will be, no?) Why does she suddenly care so much about seeing Shivrang's penis? Even her fight with Jess happens out of nowherem and is resolved in record time, allowing Cece to ask Jess to be her maid of honor. Cece just as quickly reconciles with Shivrang, declaring their "love" a leap of faith and her willingness to jump blindly into the great unknown with her new mate. Granted, they have to get all this stuff out in time for Cece and Shivrang's wedding to take place during the Season 2 finale... but who are they kidding? It's all about Nick and Jess this season.
An on that topic, Nick and Jess don't have much screen time together in "Bachelorette Party." Still, Jake Johnson earns his keep as MVP. Nick pulls out the old Dead Dad Pass to wear his late father's yellow track suit, which makes him look like both a "homeless pencil" and "Jane Lynch," but hey, the DDP trumps all! ... Except for when Jess tries to ask him for a favor (apparently, doing favors for the girl you love will override the DDP) to get a photo of Shivrang's penis for an upset Cece. Instead, Winston (who has taken Nick's place as the crazed wild card of the bunch) sends a pick of Nick's d**k. Jess has now seen Nick's d**k (and is impressed) ... can we please just get back to these two and their sexual tension again?
And, yes, of course, Nick and Jess are the couple we've been rooting for to get together for a long time running, but am I crazy for wanting Schmidt to get back together with his old college girlfriend Elizabeth, who we meet in this episode, rather than reuniting with Cece? Schmidt reconnects with her after her desperately tried to get a girlfriend in time to have a plus one to Cece's wedding.
Instantly, I like Elizabeth. I like how she knows Schmidt is only at her door because he needed something, I like how she calls him on his s**t for the mean stuff her did to her in their relationship when he got thin. And I like how she makes him the happiest we've seen him in ages by forcing him to eat a pizza. Schmidt could use someone as grounded as Elizabeth, and he seems to become his old self (no, not just Fat Schmidt) around her. I hope he really does take her on a date, not to Cece's wedding, but a proper one. She seems to bring out the good side in Schmidt. Not even Cece could do that.
"Bachelorette Party" has a few moments that warrant genuine laughter ("Cream cheese in bulk?!"), and showsNew Girl's continual progress and amazing self-awareness as a network sitcom (Nick and Winston wonder how Schmidt just instinctively knows to find and bother them at the bar). But overall, it just doesn't even come close to the calibre of recent eps like "Chicago" and "Quick Hardening Caulk." Even worse, the four friends are still all split up from each other. Can't we get the original gang back together before the season comes to a close? Especially now that Winston is a full-blown kook who blows raspberries on people's bellies and sets trash cans on fire. (You're welcome, Lamorne Morris).
Speaking of memorable moments and lines in an otherwise unmemorable, and rather disappointing episode, here are the rest that make "Bachelorette Party" worthwhile:
- "I'm Gerard Depardieu! Who do you think I am lady? I'm Schmidt!" - Schmidt, making a good first impression with Cece's future in-laws.
- Winston's failed attempted to "kidnap" Shivrang, by actually trying to kidnap him instead of just get him away from the girls' party. (He brought a bat! Winston is crazy!)
- Schmidt being upset that a lady would throw his advances back at him "like a comedy pie."
- Nick pulling the DDP no less than a dozen times throughout the episode. (Not to mention claiming he has recently been "one-half orphaned"). If only he could have used it in college when he had to watch Schmidt and Elizabeth make out in their dorm.
- "When you question my pajama sets, you question our friendship!"- Jess' cry to Cece.
- The fact that Schmidt noticed Alfredo the stripper was crying in the elevator, which means Schmidt knows Alfredo the stripper.
- "Hello, Jew"- Nadia getting reacquainted with Schmidt.
- "Welcome home, melted cheese"- Schmidt, getting reacquainted with pizza.
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Synopsis

A one-hour children's oriented film, appearing as part of the "Disney Sunday Movie" series, about a teenage inventor whose inventions usually go awry, causing problems for his mother and earning him the reputation of being number one nerd at school. Things change when he invents a high-powered jump bike.